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There comes a time in every man's life when he's consumed by the desire to spit on his palms, hoist the black flag and start cutting throats.

H. L. Mencken

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H. L. Mencken
Age: 75 †
Born: 1880
Born: September 12
Died: 1956
Died: January 29
Autobiographer
Essayist
Historian
Journalist
Linguist
Literary Critic
Satirist
Social Critic
Writer
Baltimore
Maryland
Henry Louis Mencken
Life
Start
Spit
Desire
Flag
Fear
Consumed
Black
Flags
Comes
Throat
Every
Rage
Hoist
Men
Atheism
Throats
Time
Cutting
Palms

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Adultery is the application of democracy to love.
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The government consists of a gang of men exactly like you and me. They have, taking one with another, no special talent for the business of government they have only a talent for getting and holding office.
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I believe that it should be perfectly lawful to print even things that outrage the pruderies and prejudices of the general, so long as any honest minority, however small, wants to read them. The remedy of the majority is not prohibition, but avoidance.
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The music critic, Huneber, could never quite make up his mind about a new symphony until he had seen the composer's mistress.
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Has the art of politics no apparent utility? Does it appear to be unqualifiedly ratty, raffish, sordid, obscene, and low down, andits salient virtuosi a gang of unmitigated scoundrels? Then let us not forget its high capacity to soothe and tickle the midriff, its incomparable services as a maker of entertainment.
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Pedagogues: More than any other class of blind leaders of the blind they are responsible for the degrading standardization which now afflicts the American people.
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The thing constantly overlooked by those hopefuls who talk about abolishing war is that it is by no means an evidence of decay but rather a proof of health and vigor.
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To wage a war for a purely moral reason is as absurd as to ravish a woman for a purely moral reason
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A politician normally prospers under democracy in proportion ... as he excels in the invention of imaginary perils and imaginary defenses against them.
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In Baltimore, soft crabs are always fried (or broiled) in the altogether, with maybe a small jock-strap of bacon added.
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The best years are the forties after fifty a man begins to deteriorate, but in the forties he is at the maximum of his villainy.
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Always remember this: If you don't attend the funerals of your friends, they will certainly not attend yours.
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The most valuable of all human possessions, next to a superior and disdainful air, is the reputation of being well-to-do.
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In the United States, doing good has come to be, like patriotism, a favorite device of persons with something to sell.
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Absence is the dark-room in which lovers develop negatives.
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